1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a snowshoe and, more specifically, to an improvement intended to at least partially reset the natural transverse balance position of the user's foot, with respect to the frame of the snowshoe when advancing occurs on sloped terrain.
2. Description of Background and Material Information
A snowshoe having the aforementioned type of improvement is described in European Patent application No. 613 703. According to this document, the snowshoe has, in a known manner, a screen encased in a frame, defining the carrying surface, and a support piece extending within the frame of the snowshoe, and on which is attached the boot with which the user's foot is provided. This support piece enables the foot to pivot in order to ease walking, and in this improved version, is adapted to allow at least the partial resetting of the natural transverse balance position of the foot with respect to the frame of the snowshoe when the latter is laterally inclined. More specifically, the support piece is journalled about two axes located on a support attached to the screen. These axes are oriented in a substantially perpendicular manner with respect to each other, one defining the vertical pivoting direction of the support piece, and the other, the lateral pivoting direction of the support with respect to the longitudinal axis of the frame of the snowshoe, using two aligned pivoting axes. As described and taught, the assembly constituted by the support piece and the support is thereby capable of pivoting laterally with very great ease since the support acts like a balance beam that remains balanced on its pivoting axes essentially when the weight applied on it vertically is equally distributed in the direction transverse to the snowshoe, i.e., perpendicular to the pivoting axes. Conversely, in the case where the weight exerted by the foot is greater on one side of the snowshoe, which happens inevitably as soon as advancing occurs on a sloped terrain, the "support piece-support" assembly immediately tilts on the pivoting axes of the support by lowering itself on the heavier side and raising itself on the other. Consequently, the "support piece-support" assembly cannot, of itself, bring the user's foot back to its natural transverse balance position, i.e., into an almost horizontal plane. Indeed, in the absence of deliberate physical effort and/or blocking of the journal of the foot by the user, the foot tilts towards the heavier side. In fact, this pivoting potential provided to the support piece by the support only offers a random solution to the issue of the transverse retention of the foot on the snowshoes when advancing occurs on sloped terrain. Also, given that the support piece with its support tilts laterally at the slightest lateral variation of the weight applied on it vertically, it follows that even the simplest support engagement of the user's foot on the snowshoe is capable of making it tilt if it is not perfectly perpendicular to its pivoting axes. This is what happens almost always when walking with snowshoes, even on a horizontal terrain; indeed, advancing with snowshoes imposes a particular walk on the user through which he/she alternately takes support on one foot and then on the other while keeping the feet separated from one another to avoid hooking the frames of the snowshoes together. The result of such walking is that the weight exerted by the foot on the support piece is naturally always greater on the inside and therefore the support piece tilts by lowering itself on this same side and by raising itself on the other side until the support rests on the surface of the ground.
Therefore, such a mounting of the support piece is very restrictive for the user since at every step, and regardless of the slope of the terrain, the foot on which the user presses down tends to tilt laterally and abruptly, since the support functions like a balance beam. Consequently, the user is always at the risk of being laterally unbalanced, even on a horizontal terrain, especially since there are no means allowing for a possible dampening of the lateral tilting movement of the support piece and its support. Also, the absence of a means capable of laterally maintaining the support piece in a plane substantially parallel to that of the carrying surface of the snowshoe makes it difficult to put the snowshoe on, as the user must present the foot slantwise to the side where the support piece tilts naturally when it is not weighted down.
Furthermore, given the fact that the support is positioned, with respect to the screen of the snowshoe, at a constant height by its aligned pivoting axes, the adherence and/or grip of the snowshoe on the ground, especially on sloped terrain, can be problematic; indeed, only that edge of the support which is on the side where the latter was lowered is susceptible of being projected with respect to the plane of the carrying surface of the snowshoe, and this, no matter what the laterally applied weight is, whether from the sloped terrain or the user's weight.